Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1887-01-27

Hrlzes are oHered In the country schools
to girls who will show that they can make
nice butter in the meagerly furnished
dairies Of the neighborhood. This will
result in the girls coming to the schools
who are better prepared to take the sys-
tematio course offered. Denmark has
several such schools in successful opera
ton.
In General.
FACTS WHICH ALL FARMERS SHOULD he
MEMBER.
It is not in nature for a hen to Law the
year round, any more than 1t is for a
COW to give milk the year round; hence,
If you want eggs in winter, you must
make preparation accordingly by having
lot of pullets Matched in February or
March, and kept thriftily growing through
the summer, SO that they will have ar
rived at the laying age by the beginning
of winter. Then provide warm quarters
with abundant food consisting of wheat
and oats, instead of corn), and do not
forget that the hen is carnivorous as we'll
as herbivorous, and should have meat
scraps of some sort in winter to replace
the worms and insects which she con-
sumes IL the fresh state in summer. One
more point to be mentioned is that the
hen must be healthy to lay, and if you
have cholera in the flock you need expect
no eggs.
The busy buttermakers of England
Ireland and Jersey, as well as in this
country, are gradually dropping the prac-
tice of seasoning butter with salt, and are
using brine in its stead. Those who are
far enough along to appreciate the diff
ference between gathering butter in
lump and handling it in grsnules are in
position to adopt brine seasoning with
ease and decided benefit. All that is nee
essary for such buttermaker to do is,
when the butter has come, to wash in the
usual way with water till it runs off clear,
and then immerse the granules of butter
in brine as strong as it can be made, and
let the butter lie in it the same length of
time he would to have salt dissolve If he
had used dry salt, and then press the but
ter into solid form, avoiding any fric-
ton or grinding motion while reducing
1t to solid. In this way all working will
be avoided, and the butter left in the best
possible condition for keeping, and have
an even color and the highest flavor it is
possible for it to have. By lying in strong
brine few hours the brine will draw the
water out of the butter the same as dry
salt would.
Professor Arnold relates an instance of
COW that was tethered to the leeward of
lOt of onions. In short time her milk
tasted so strong of onions that it was
unfit for use. Cows should breathe pure
air.
The White Minorcas, q new beeed of
poultry in this country, resemble the
Black Minorcas in all except color. A
writer in the Poultry Keeper says that the
chicks are very strong, end that pullets
often begin to lay when eighteen weeks
old. The egg is large and white, one
dozen often weighing one pound and
fourteen ounces from young birds, and
two pounds from mature hens.
A test was recently made at Sumpter of
the Mason cotton harvester, regarding
which the Charleston News and Courier
says: THE machine has more than
realized the expectations of the com pany,
both as the capacity and quality of work.
Despite the wind-tossed and storm-beaten
condition of the cotton now in the field.
the machine gathered at the rate of $3.50
pounds of cotton for a day of ten hours,
and gathered the cotton with practically
no waste at all. The capacity of the ma
chine has, in little over month of ex
pertinent, been nearly doubled, and the
defect OF wasting portion of the cotton
has been entirely removed. It was pre-
dlcted by the committees that the defects
in the machine which they saw operated
in October could and would be speedily
overcome; but it was hardly expected,
even by the most sanguine, that in so
short time such a great improvement
would be effected. That such is the case
only goes to show that the great problem
of picking cotton by machinery has been
practically solved, and that the early in
PRODUCTION of the Mason harvester into
the cotton fields of the South is an assur-
ed fact
In a discussion on feeding skinned
milk, participated in by Messrs. Hoard,
Boyd, Johnson, White and and others
at the thirteenth annual convention of the
Illinois Dairymen's Association, most of
the speakers contended that where dairy
men can and do get an average of twenty
cents pound for their butter, it paws
better to take the cream from the milk
before it is fed and buy corn at cent
pound and feed that with the Skinned
milk. Others were of the opinion that
there was absolutely no life in skinned
milk, and that 1t was diverging too much
from nature to expect calves to do well
on skinned milk and cold feed. Never
the less practical men know that the val
liable constituents of milk are contained
where only the cream is separated saving
only the butter.
A box 15X15x10 inside will hold bush
Ell. Such boxes every fruit grower ought
to have. Make them now during the win
ter. Half inch poplar for the sides and
bottom and inch pine for the ends.
If the apples should freeze do this:
Stand the barrels on the bottom head.
Remove the top head and half bushel
of the fruit; then fill the barrel full of
clean snow, well packed down; place the
barrels In moderately warm room. and
in day Or two they will be all right and
better than before frosted.